Sketchbook

Some apps are named after exactly what they replace. Sketchbook is the drawing app that behaves like its paper namesake: open it and you are looking at a clean page, not a dashboard. The interface is deliberately unobtrusive — purpose-built for sketching — so the tools stay out of sight until the moment you reach for them.

The toolkit is broader than the name suggests. Pencils, markers, airbrushes, and smear tools headline a full complement of brush types, tuned to look and feel like their physical counterparts, and every brush is highly customizable so the exact mark you want is a setting away rather than a compromise. A two-minute thumbnail and a finished illustration are equally at home here.

Precision is there when the drawing stops being loose. Guides, rulers, and stroke tools steady lines that need to be exact, and layers with a full set of blend modes let you build drawings and color in stages — try a direction on its own layer, keep it or drop it, without wrecking what is underneath. That layering is what turns sketching into exploring: variations cost nothing.

Artists and illustrators have rated this app award-worthy for its natural, distraction-free feel, and it suits anyone who draws for a living or purely for the pleasure of it. If your sketchbook is the notebook you actually use, this is the version that never runs out of pages and never needs sharpening.